page_title: Mylodon
section_title: Taxonomy
hierarchical_section_title: Mylodon / Taxonomy
caption_attribution_description: Mylodon darwini skin and fur at the Museum für Naturkunde, Berlin.
context_page_description: Mylodon is an extinct genus of ground sloths that lived in South America; Patagonia. The most recent credible date obtained from its remains has been reported to be 10,200 BP.
context_section_description: Mylodon's close relatives include the ground sloths of the genera Glossotherium and Paramylodon. The latter genus has often been confused with Glossotherium, but Paramylodon is a distinct genus that was restricted to the Pleistocene of North America. Glossotherium also shares a long history of taxonomic confusion with Mylodon, and currently the only recognized species is Mylodon darwini. At one time, the elephant-sized Megatherium was thought to be closely related, but is recognized as belonging to a separate family (Megatheriidae).
  Recent molecular sequence results obtained using collagen and mitochondrial DNA extracted from fossils indicate that the closest living relatives of Mylodon are the two-toed sloths of genus Choloepus.  This revelation came as a surprise, since morphological analyses had previously suggested that two-toed sloths were close to Caribbean sloths and Megalonyx, now regarded as representing two separate and distant branches of the sloth evolutionary tree.
caption: Fur and skin at the Museum für Naturkunde, Berlin
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